News Headlines - 24 March 2011

▽Japan radiation levels uncertain: Should evacuation zone be bigger? - Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2011/0324/Japan-radiation-levels-uncertain-Should-evacuation-zone-be-bigger
Difficulties in measuring radiation are increasing confusion in Japan. The government must weigh incomplete and sometimes contradictory data before making decisions.

▽Japan Disaster Raises Questions About Backup Power at U.S. Nuclear Plants - New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2011/03/24/24greenwire-japan-disaster-raises-questions-about-backup-p-16451.html
The batteries that back up power at most U.S. nuclear plants are required to last about as long as the average cellphone battery -- four hours.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission says that's enough. The agency's critics say it's not. And those critics are pointing to the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan, which is teetering on the brink of meltdown because it lost power.

▽Japan car parts shortage spreads overseas - MarketWatch
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/japan-car-parts-shortage-spreads-overseas-2011-03-24?dist=countdown
Japanese auto makers are slowly getting back to business in their devastated home country, but industry analysts warn that the full brunt of post-earthquake supply disruptions likely won’t be felt globally until next month.

▽Japan rebuilding to drive materials demand - Reuters
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/24/us-mining-summit-japan-idUSTRE72N79A20110324
The catastrophic earthquake that rocked Japan will drive up sales of key materials the country needs to rebuild from the estimated $300 billion in damage, company executives told the Reuters Global Mining and Steel Summit on Thursday.

▽Japan Will Rebuild From Quake But Faces Other Daunting Tests - Wall Street Journal
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703784004576220770999985288.html
"There are two really big questions hanging over Japan," says Clyde Prestowitz, a former U.S. trade negotiator who writes on Asia. "The population is shrinking, and in the long term they're committing slow suicide. And second is the bureaucratic, dysfunctional system. Politicians don't have a lot of power. And the regulators don't regulate industry for the public, they regulate it for their own retirement."
In both regards—how it survives in the long term, and how it chooses to manage itself—the clock is running for Japan. Cohesion is one thing, stasis quite another.